Mutant Storm has been submitted and will be released on the 14th of June. Here's the release trailer! Subscribe to the TouchArcade YouTube channel Once the game has been optimised for the iPad1, I have plans to enhance the game for the iPad2. The iPad2 version will sit somewhere between the original Mutant Storm and Mutant Storm Reloaded... I'm excited about that because I really want to push the shaders on the iPad2 and instead of the usual graphics blurb that publishers normally ram down your throats, I want to go down the abstract route or towards where Mutant Storm Reloaded ended up at. The game is a duel stick shooter - there are lots of plans to support different types of controls as well as hard controls like the Gamepad device that has just been announced. The game will support HD output to the TV. There will be online aspects, and maybe multiplayer. There is still quite a lot of work involved to reach those goals but I thought it would be interesting to use this thread as a diary of sorts on the development of iOS Mutant Storm and to show what goes into the development process. Ok, what's next on my list: 1. Get some type of controls working. 2. Getting the sound to work.
This video shows sound and controls working I am presently optimising Vertex formats and the processing of them in the Tripper 3D graphics engine. All good fun.
Even though the controls have not been fine tuned yet it works pretty well. The controls are analog with self centring... This means the centre of the joysticks auto corrects if you go too far in one direction, which in turn makes going left, right, up and down instantaneous. This will not be the only method of controls. There will be digital versions, a combination of both. There will be lots of configurations and implementations to choose from because in my views the more choice the better for the player. Also, touch will not be the only controls on offer as we intend to support all the common hard controllers out there - from the new gamepad, iCade, and the rest. The intention is we are covering all types of controls for a duel stick shooter because we intend to make this the best one on iOS!
Absolutely love this - played the heck out on the 360. Should be gorgeous on an iPad screen, but I hope the difficulty compensates for the touch control. I mean, even playing with a 360 controller, this game gets sadistically hard, imagine with virtual controls? Of course, iCade support is more than welcome!
We are considering difficulty and how touch controls effect the game... An easy option would be to slow the game down - the game was designed to update at a 100fps and render at 60fps, so making the update slower will make the game more easier to play. Another idea is having a shield that depletes and when empty you die... At the moment you die as soon as something hits you - I feel in modern games players tastes that this will be essential to make the game accessible and away from it's hardcore roots. Anyway, lots of things to think about but first the 3d engine needs to be optimised.
If it is made easier for touch screen then I hope you allow an option for the original mode for purists. This is especially true for those using an external controller if you allow those.
Yes, I agree that the original mode will be left in for the purists that will own hardware controllers. I think there can be modes of various types... For example intelligent auto fire so that the player is not even concerned about the firing aspect to the game. Each one of these new modes will have a different leaderboard connected, so if you are a hardcore purest with a hardware controller then you will feel you are competing with people in the same league. And the same for someone in easy peasy mode. I think Mutant Storm will be a game that will sell the hardware controllers to the game buying public But don't get me wrong touch works pretty well as well... But I feel for this game to do well every whim and wish of players and there preferred method of controls needs to be catered for.
This video shows Mutant Storm running on the iPad 2 at 60fps. It also shows off the new background warping effect. The original game used about 8 layers of fullscreen alpha to achieve an effect that looks like feedback. This is actually a very inefficient way to achieve these types of effects in this age of Render Targets. What happens now is I have two render targets, I render the effect I want in say Screen 1, then I merge Screen 2 into Screen1, which causes feedback. Then I swap Screen1 and Screen2 around and just repeat. With shaders you can make this feedback very efficient and gain lot's of render time back. The project is at the stage where the menus and online aspects need sorting out but that will be after GDC now.
The plan is for April or May this year. We are weighing up lots of options at the moment and may also opt to use a publisher - which could delay things. But for me it can be finished pretty pronto. After GDC we will have a better idea on the direction we will be taking, that's for sure
Before Beat Hazard, Mutant Storm has been one of my favorite dual stick shooters. Any chance of getting it to work on for us iPod Touch / iPhone users? Still waiting for the release of the PC version of Mutant Storm Reloaded on Steam.
The game was designed for a large screen and with lots of moving enemies/bullets and such, plus your thumbs on the screen, we feel the game will be unplayable. We may look into ways of combatting this... But it will be after the iPad version is released. It''s not for me to speak on Pompom's behalf, so I really cannot answer that.
